Spitsbergen the Artic

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Lourdes Odette Aquitania Ricasa,

World Traveler, Author, Artist, Motivational Speaker, Pianist.

Born: Manila, Philippines

Residence:  San Clemente, California

Genre: Travel short stories, Fiction, Non-Fiction and Poems.  Books include Sketches as an Artist.

Influences: Paul Coelho, Guy de Maupassant, Antonio Machado, Jose Rizal

Publisher: www.authorhouse.com

Radio and Television interviews:

1)    Television interview:  Top Matin Show, Brazzaville,  Republic of Congo,

2)   Kamenge Youth Center, Bujumbura, Burundi

3)   Radio interview:  Zaragoza 99, Spain

4)   Adelphia Television: Encore about books and paintings.

Travel meetings

DESCRIPTION Los Angeles, CA

The Network for Travel Club is a fun group of travel addicts in the LOS ANGELES, California, area who meet at a different restaurant each month to exchange travel tips and ideas. Formed in 1992, our aim is to add to our exploration of the globe, its people and cultures as well as ourselves. Our events are announced in the Travel Section of the Los Angeles Times.

The president is Lourdes Odette Ricasa, who has traveled to 252 countries, see list of countries www.travelerscenturyclub.org.  Also an author, she has written four books about her travels. google: Lourdes Odette Ricasa or surf: www.authorhouse.com.

She invites speakers who show slides about their exciting adventures, eg: Yemen, Nepal, Armenia, Antarctica, etc.  During the meeting, a microphone is passed around.  Each guest shares any travel tips or inquiries. You can pass your turn, if you do not feel like speaking. 

The club has no membership fees; it's a pay-as-you-attend affair, with the cost ranging from $22. to $26.  The EVENT includes a complete lunch, payment for the speaker’s lunch, and operating expenses, such as printing flyers, etc. Email: Odette Ricasa odette25@aol.com.

Network for Travel Club**(No membership fees required) 

DATE OF EVENT : Saturday, April 12, 2014

Time: 12:00 noon - Social hour 12:30- Lunch is served. Travel presentation immediately follows. 3:00 PM - End of event. 

Place: Babylon Restaurant (Greek cuisine) 162 No. Sierra Madre Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91107 (near corner Foothill Blvd.)  Tel. (626) 395-7772.  Pls. use your GPS or call the restaurant for specific directions.  Parking available at the side and rear.

**We receive inquiries asking if it is possible to attend the presentation only & skip the lunch. Our goal is to network. The EVENT price includes: lunch plus (28%=10% sales tax, plus 18% gratuity), speaker’s fee & operating expenses as a CLUB. We use the restaurant for 3-1/2 hours, our menu is discounted. It is a STRICT policy of the Restaurant and the CLUB to count PER HEAD. We are a voluntary group & do not charge a membership fee.  In order to avoid unpleasant issues, it has always been our policy to charge ONE PRICE for the EVENT (with or without lunch).

Menu: Moussaka, a traditional Greek dish of layered eggplant w/ a meat filling topped with a creamy bechamel sauce, is baked to perfection.  Served w/ fluffy basmati rice and grilled tomato & pepper. Vegetarian: Veggie plate of hummus, babba gannoush (mashed eggplant mashed mixed with olive oil and seasonings), muhammara (pepper & walnut dip), carrot salad, tabule, 2 pcs. Sarma 2 pcs falafel.  Includes soft drinks or iced tea. Desert: vanilla cake.

EVENT Cost: $20.00 includes: lunch, (28%=10% tax, 18% tip), speaker’s lunch & operating expenses.

SPEAKER:  DICK DURANT  At age 65 took up mountaineering by climbing Mt. Rainier in Washington State.  That led to climbing Mt. Adams and Mt. St. Helens in Washington, Mt. Hood in Oregon, and Mt. Shasta in California.  The next trip was to Africa to experience the local culture and climb Kilimanjaro.  Africa was followed by a trip to Nepal to visit Everest Base Camp and climb a 20,000’ peak near the base of Mt. Everest while enjoying the local people and observing how they live. 

TOPIC:  NEPAL TREK & CLIMB  During the 28 day trip, which began in Kathmandu, there were many opportunities to observe the creativity and hard work of the friendly Nepali people as they provided for their families.  Lukla, the world’s most dangerous airport with 55 round trip flights a day is the entrance to the high country.  The supply of electricity for refrigeration is limited so meat is in short supply.  At the higher elevations vegetables and fruit are not available.  What is available are internet and cell phone service up to 16,000’.  The group of 10 stayed in “tea houses” along the way but they were not the elegant Japanese type tea houses that come to mind when tea houses are mentioned.  There is heat for less than two hours a day in a main room and the average temperature in the sleeping areas is about 40 degrees.  Halfway in to Everest Base Camp is Namche Bazaar, the main trading center for the Khumbu region, which is spread out over the steep side of a mountain.  The scenery is awesome and later in the trip some of the world’s highest mountains are in constant view.  At the end of the trip what should have been a 35 minute flight from Lukla to Kathmandu turned into a seven day journey due to bad weather.  It included starting to walk 6-7 days out to a trail head to catch a bus, catching a helicopter out only to land on a dirt airstrip half way to Kathmandu, and then a day later taking a military transport the rest of the way out.           

Rsvp: Odette Ricasa  cell: (323) 578-3601 Odette25@aol.com

Lourdes Odette Aquitania Ricasa has written four books:

PIECES OF DREAMS

By LOURDES ODETTE AQUITANIA RICASA

Pieces of Dreams best describes the excitement of a journey, from the remote and magical cities of Bukhara and Samarkand, the diverse terrain of the Kazakh steppes, the rare beauty of  Kyrgyzstan to the fairy tale castles of Spain.

Lourdes Odette Aquitania Ricasa has traveled by foot, by bus, train and slept with families.  Her poetry contains her encounter with Central Asia’s people and landscape, the enigmatic megaliths of Malta, the wonders of the world, bringing a tantalizing invitation to more travels.

Her book paints a rich picture of our universe.  Above all, it is full of the sights, sounds and laughter in the extraordinary places she visited.

Many wonders of the world both physical and man-made give an inspiration to the reader and help decide on where to go next. 

Running With Echoes of Desire

By Lourdes Odette Aquitania Ricasa

Lourdes Odette Aquitania Ricasa is an artist and a world traveler.

She loves to paint and took painting lessons at the Mission Renaissance Art School in Pasadena, California, in Biarritz, France, Alicante, Spain and Bishkek Kyrgyzstan. She has on display more than one hundred works of art.

Wandering from one moment to the next from Vanuatu to Tasmania and then perhaps she will be back to Vanuatu, sometimes with a sudden crisis of the heart, in which she does not act or react. Some unconscious choices how a particular individual behaves, leading to a drama of psychological inclination.

Running with Echoes of Desire is a clear exercise of her talents, a special type of poetry for readers. For without love, without poetry, we become squeezed in social conventions.

Destined to satisfy our literary cravings, a fleeting movement, a magnetic power has exerted a distinct influence in the art of her writing.

The book jump starts our imagination. It tells us about life. Words that shine to new truths. It contains more than two hundred fifty poems and newsletters and her Art sketches.

Exciting…she prefers to stay at the Paradores of Spain, chains of Palaces in Santiago de Compostela, Leon, Ducal Palace of Lerma, Trujillo and the Posada Dos Loios de Evora in Portugal. These places immortalizes yesterday, where the past emerges when Kings and royalty stayed here.

There were times, she stayed in dorm beds in Iceland and Lake Baikal, Siberia. She quips “It was so much fun. I made a lot of friends.”

Having traveled to two hundred eleven countries, her book is a premiere show case, the world on pages begins in her journeys. At times telling us what we do not already know or somehow we never framed the way she expresses it.

Unguarded Thoughts

By Lourdes Odette Ricasa

In Unguarded Thoughts, Lourdes Odette Ricasa has undertaken an extraordinary exploration of her travels and works of art. The book reveals her poignant side. One can feel the moment and it does not take long to feel what she expresses.

Seeker of sunlight and bright skies, fascinated by light, shadows and colors, she has compiled poems written since nineteen hundred and eighty seven. By seeing through the eyes of an artist, she has also written about the enjoyment, rewards and pleasures of painting and everyday experiences in life.

The depth of text is impressive in the way she has superbly presented the beauty of Spain. The Cow Bells of Monte Perdido, The Magic of Flamenco, the long and memorable sunsets at the Alhambra, the caves of Guadix and Flamboyant Seville are a few examples.

Filled with the spirits of Asia, the book begins with the splendor of Angkor Wat, Cambodia and ends with the poem "Life Without Television". She emphasizes her dislike or hatred for watching television, which she considers a waste of time. This explains how she was able to accomplish her goals in life.

The poems include verses of daily life in the Philippines, where she was born.

In more than ten years time, Odette has left an indelible mark of her travels around the globe.

EXCERPTS FROM LIFE

By LOURDES ODETTE RICASA

Excerpts From Life is a book that contains two hundred forty four poems about exotic travel and fascinating life experiences. Persons  are best characterized by the examples of local people within the country she visited. 

She portrays people she met and revered in illusion, dotes on fantasy and rides on poetry without harness.  Her style is free verse, some with alternating rhymes.  Her book shows a new concept of the height of her spiritual and emotional purity giving finesse that verses might attain.

Poetry that puts colors to the landscape, adding to them Odette’s feelings, from the iced mountains of the Alps and the PyreneesMountains to the hot winds of Arizona, Colorado and Samarkand. Reading her vivid poems makes the pulse of life vibrate with the sunsets and sunrises of old Europe.   ---Edmundo Uguet – Alicante,Spain

“Life in Ghana” reached my heart.  I actually visualized every skilled detail described with a deep passion carefully blending the various experiences and moments with unbelievable creativity.  ---  CarolynWachira - Nairobi, Kenya

Sincerely, your poems enchanted me.  I thought of you as a twin soul, a dreamer and adventurer.  I thought of you as a twin soul. Your poems that have words as smooth as the petals of a perfumed flower.  --- Adela Montes, Guatemala City, Guatemala